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San Francisco, CA - Freshest Figures for New Home Sales Suggest Market Drop is Subsiding

Posted on: Feb 06, 2012 09:39:09 AM

In November, there was a fall year-over-year in new home sales in the San Francisco, CA market, but there were hints the market may be evening out from a percentage decline less than October 2011. New home sales saw a decline of 11.5% from the year earlier to 270 after sales declined 33.1% in October from the year earlier.

A total of 2,747 new homes were sold during the 12 months that ended in November, down from 2,782 for the year that ended in October.

A year earlier, new home sales accounted for 6.8% of overall housing sales and the percentage declined to 5.8% of sales in November 2011. For new and existing homes, sales increased year-over-year in November after also increasing in October year-over-year.

Pricing and Mortgage Trends

In November, the average per-unit price of new homes dipped by 4.7% year-over-year to $558,887. This decline is larger than the 2.0% decline in October from a year earlier.

The average mortgage size on newly sold homes moved south year-over-year in contrast to new home prices. The average mortgage size declined to $400,006 in November, marking a 10.0% decline compared with last year. Average mortgage size went from $452,688 in October 2010 to $451,514 in October 2011. Of the overall sale price, the percentage that was being financed fell 4.2 percentage points year-over-year to 71.6% in November 2011. In October 2011, there was a 1.3 percentage point rise from a year earlier.

Other Market Trends

There has not been much movement in the composition of the market with regard of the types of properties sold. From a year ago, single-family home sales have moved from 53.8% of new home sales to 54.4% of sales while attached units have gone from 46.2% of sales to 45.6% of sales.

The average unit size of newly sold homes declined 13.5% year-over-year to 1,774 square feet in November 2011.

Foreclosures and real estate owned (REO) sales decreased in November from a year earlier, but remained a burden on the market. Together, foreclosures plus REO sales accounted for 38.6% of existing home sales, down from 48.8% a year earlier. The percentage of existing home sales involving foreclosures slipped to 20.7% in November from 23.5% a year earlier while REO sales as a percentage of existing home sales declined to 17.9% from 25.4% a year earlier.

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